Mukherjee, who spent a decade working in mergers and acquisitions and travelled frequently to Mumbai, says his friendships with the city’s ultra‑wealthy sparked the idea for the novel, which is published by Penguin Random House.

In a video interview from his home in Surrey, England, Mukherjee explained that after the pandemic lockdown many household helpers—often treated as quasi‑family—were abruptly dismissed, a reality that forms a key backdrop for the story.

The novel follows three narrators: George Abercrombie, a 68‑year‑old expatriate who discovers his Bollywood‑star wife Sweety dead; Amit, his long‑serving man‑Friday on the run from goons; and Gemma, Sweety’s assistant entangled in a blackmail plot. Mukherjee chose the three perspectives to give non‑Indian readers entry points into the plot, contrasting a rich American, a middle‑class American woman, and an Indian servant.

Mukherjee also drew on the 2006 Nithari killings in Noida, where a businessman was convicted for corrupting his servant, to underline the fraught employer‑servant relationship that permeates the book. He says the novel shows how public opinion can shift from blaming the servant to accusing “foreigners” of corrupting innocent workers.

The author describes the characters as “grubby little people” at heart, despite their different social stations, and uses the setting to satirise both Indian and Western societies, including the stark contrast between express elevators for the rich and cramped, un‑air‑conditioned lifts for the poor.

Mukherjee’s earlier crime series, set in colonial Calcutta, gave way to contemporary India in this work, allowing him to examine how the country is shaped by internal and external forces. He says Sweety, the deceased actress, embodies a vision of an open, cosmopolitan India, while also representing victims of sexual harassment and patriarchal control.

Looking ahead, Mukherjee hints at a new series set in the Scottish Highlands featuring two middle‑aged women—one Indian, one Scottish—who run a local store and become embroiled in international crime.